Art Departmental at Hot Docs 2011

As many of you may know, Art Departmental is based out of Toronto, Canada and as such we have access to easily two of the greatest festivals in the World. That being the Toronto International Film Festival and of course North America’s largest documentary festival, Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival. I have been granted special access to cover the festival and thus for the first time I bring you full coverage of Hot Docs 18th year with exclusive previews and insight into the best documentaries of the year.

This year Hot Docs brings us 199 documentaries from around the globe from 3D to animation to re-enactments. “Every year we start with the goal of showing everything documentary can do. Yet, more so than ever, what documentary is doing is re-inventing itself, expanding our notions of its capacity to communicate contemporary stories and ideas,” explains Sean Farnel, Hot Docs Director of Programming. He couldn’t have put it better. We are currently in the golden age of documentary filmmaking. No longer need we snore through a documentary about a caterpillar turning into a butterfly as we did in elementary school. Documentary is now more than just mere education, it can be as entertaining, shocking, ground-breaking and visual as any non-fiction film around.

If you are not in the Toronto area do not fret. You can check out most of the trailers and some clips on the Hot Docs Youtube Channel. Hot Docs also has an amazing online library of docs that I can’t recommend highly enough. You will find incredible gems on this website that will change the way you look at the World around you: http://www.hotdocslibrary.ca/.

OF NOTE: I can not talk about documentary filmmaking without mentioning the huge loss of Tim Hetherington, co-director of the Oscar-nominated documentary Restrepo, who died alongside his colleague, esteemed photojournalist Chris Hondros during a mortar attack in Libya yesterday. My sincerest sympathies go out to their family, friends, colleagues and all those whose lives they touched through their astounding acts of journalism and bravery.

Posted by Rose Lagacé

Rose Lagacé is a production designer for film & television by day and an emerging filmmaker by night. Rose is also the creator and editor of Art Departmental where she celebrates the art and craft of production design.

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Art Departmental is a production design resource created by production designer, Rose Lagacé. Our goal is to create informative and inspiring content while providing quality resources to learn about production design. We are dedicated to connecting film and television creatives around the idea that production design matters.

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